


Break Me

by riteinthefeels



Series: Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace [2]
Category: Norse Mythology, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Bottom Thor, But they made me, Cockblocking, I am so sorry, I didn't even want to finish it because it was making me sad, M/M, Pseudo-Incest, Really sad shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-01
Updated: 2013-08-01
Packaged: 2017-12-22 03:08:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/908185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riteinthefeels/pseuds/riteinthefeels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki's training and trials are complete, and Thor needs him to fight the dark elves. Thor also needs him for more personal reasons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Break Me

**Author's Note:**

> A continuation of [Make Me](http://archiveofourown.org/works/859286) . I'm really sorry this took so long. I'm also really sorry for all the things I did to Loki. Definitely read Make Me first.

Thor’s visits became less frequent after his appointment as general in command of Asgard’s forces. For routine tasks and smaller disturbances, Loki remained half-forgotten in his cell, only to be taken out and dusted off when a true threat loomed.

They called him Thor’s secret weapon. In murmured jibes behind his back, they called him something far less complimentary.

He despised the arrangement, yet a part of him yearned for it, felt at peace when he could be unleashed as the stolen relic he was, put to use for the good of all those he loved—of whom he still, somehow, required approval.

The first time Thor had asked, Loki had taunted him.

“You must be truly desperate, to come to me for help. I had come to believe you had no need of your dog, now that his obedience has been proven to the masses,” he snarled.

The thunderer’s incorrigible smile was nowhere to be found that day. Loki couldn’t remember when he had last been graced with it. Certainly Thor’s radiance had eluded him since the abyss, but before then? Was the rope frayed even before the fall?

Thor responded with a weary stare cast as he opened the door to the crystal prison. Frigga’s words from the previous night echoed in Loki’s head: _Your brother loves you,_ and his own mental response, _Then why hasn’t he come before now? Why does he come only when he has use of me?_

“Loki, Asgard needs you. I—the Svartalfar have magic that we cannot comprehend. We need you to—“

“To take the brunt of their attacks so that Odin’s cherished son makes it back home alive and with his pride intact?”

“—to decipher their methods and help us plan a counter-attack,” Thor finished, anger rising beneath a darkened visage.

“Why do you do this, brother? When you know I am more than capable of holding my own, why do you goad me?”

Loki rose and closed the space between them swiftly, hot breath uncomfortably close to Thor’s stubbled cheek as he leaned into his not-brother.

“Because, my _dear_ brother, I so enjoy seeing you squirm, caught like a cornered animal between Odin’s disapproval and my own transgressions.”

Swallowing his rage for the battlefield, Thor grimaced at the lie-smith and clapped a hand to his own neck. His palm slid back down to his side and he turned, leading the way from the musty dungeon.

~*~

The battle raged below them, if it could even properly be called a battle. More of a skirmish, the Svartalfar’s only advantage being their use of seidr. The elves were grossly outnumbered, but cunning and desperation lent them strength.

Loki stood statuesque on the knoll, assessing the fray with Thor impatiently fidgeting beside him. The enemy moved with a grace the einherjar simply did not possess, dancing away from thrusts and swipes as if the battlefield were but a ballroom. Their offensive maneuvers were quite simple flame attacks, permeating straight through the warrior’s aegises.

“Thor, your warriors seem to have two left feet,” Loki observed. “See how the elves caper about your men? They resist attacks simply on account of being in the right place at the right time. The spells are base enough, just well-timed.”

Loki brought his palms together before his chest, bowing his head and whispering chants the blonde could not decipher. He disengaged his hands, flicking tiny blue orbs from them like water droplets. The orbs landed on the einherjars’ shields, each one flattening and spreading upon impact to cover the surface in a protective film.

As the thunderer watched, each spell hurled at his men reflected back upon the caster, engulfing the Svartalfar in smoking pillars. Within minutes, the elves’ advantage had been demolished. Their charred bodies dotted the valley in a gruesome mockery of the wildflower blooms from the previous morning.

Shuffling down the hill, Thor nudged the first body he came to and leaned over to rummage for answers, eyes focused on the remains as he directed his queries to Loki.

“Where did they come from? Do you think they were a scouting team, or just a band of stragglers?”

No reply graced his questions and his eyes roamed the battlefield as he waited for his brother’s thoughts to come together. He stood, accounting the damage to his own unit.

“Loki?” he said, turning back to the knoll, but Loki had crept down the other side of it and was even now sprinting for freedom.

With an irritated grunt, Thor hoisted Mjolnir and launched himself into the atmosphere, landing just before the trickster. Loki collided with the brawny blonde and they both fell, Thor’s arms wrapping around his brother and twisting him to his back in the grass beneath the thunderer.

“You _must_ know that Father has eyes on you at all times,” he warned. “Why do you persist?”

Loki cackled in his face, a mad glint crossing swift as a hawk through emerald eyes.

“You can’t blame me for trying, Thor,” he teased. “If I were to just lay in my cage until you brought me out to play, and responded to every command from my master, what would be the fun in that? For either of us?”

“We are finished for the day,” Thor growled as he rose, heavy steps falling back toward the palace. Loki followed, feeling the watch of a hundred pairs of eyes that would just as soon rip him apart as haul him back to his cell. But the thunderer did not descend to the recesses of the prison, instead turning up to his quarters.

Loki stood in the hall a moment, unsure if Thor expected him to see himself to the dungeon. He stole after the blonde, inwardly kicking himself. _Who’s the chained dog, now?_ he thought bitterly.

Thor’s door was cracked and Loki slipped inside, soft footsteps drowned out by the sound of water rushing into the great stone tub. He crept into the light cast from the enormous washroom windows; his brother was already submerged, thick arms and golden head resting against the lip of the bath.

The trickster padded around to the opposite side of the basin, slipping his clothes off and sliding silently into the water. He hadn’t had a relaxing bath in ages, and the warmth washing over him was rejuvenating.

“How can I never stay mad at you for long?” Thor broke the silence.

“It’s my irresistible charm,” Loki countered.

Thor raised an eyebrow at that, staring at the ceiling.

“Do I have leave to be out of my cage unattended, or are you disobeying your father again?” Loki teased.

“Who says you are unattended?”

The blonde sighed, sponging grit from his face. “Father said you could be granted privileges, providing today went well.”

Loki snorted, “Today went well?!”

Locking his gaze, Thor measured his words carefully, as if by doing so he could turn back the clock. “I will tell him that it did. In return, you will be allowed to stay in my room at night, and you must be accompanied by myself or an einherji whenever you leave.”

The trickster scoffed, folding his arms, “I’d rather sleep in that sterilized cell than share a bed with you.”

Thor raised his arms and gestured towards the prison. “By all means, brother.”

Loki fell silent, shooting a glare at Thor that could cut glass.

They lay in the bath for a time, water leaching out their impurities and filling them with a drowsy serenity. Even the palpable apprehension between them slowly dissolved, settling at the bottom of the bath with the afternoon’s silt and sweat. Thor finally rose, rivulets following the outlines of his muscled body on their way back into the tub.

He stepped over the stone wall while Loki watched him shrewdly. “Where am I to sleep, then? At the foot of your bed like a pampered toy? Or perhaps on the cold floor? More fitting for an unpredictable cur like myself, I think.”

Thor stiffened, sighing. Navigating Loki’s constant manipulation was really taking its toll on him. “Sleep where you like. Just do not leave this room.”

A knock at the bedroom door summoned Thor’s attention. Minutes passed; Loki closed his eyes and listened to his brother shuffle around the room, clattering plates and rifling through clothing. The smell of food—real food, not the slop he had lived on for the past year and a half—beckoned him from the apartment. He waited for Thor to call him for dinner, his stomach keeping up a constant conversation with him, but the other man did not come.

Loki finally pulled himself from the tub after kicking the plug free, emerging into the outer room dripping wet and covered only in the glamour that made him Aesir. He glided over to the table and sat opposite Thor, lounging along the rough-hewn bench. Surveying the abundant spread, he filled his plate and leaned back.

Thor cleared his throat, “I had your clothing brought to my room after you… fell. It’s all in that trunk in the corner.” He gestured with a half-eaten hunk of bread.

The trickster ate slowly, savoring each bite. “So where is this unfounded trust coming from, anyway? I almost expect it from you, but never from Odin. Why does he think I’ll stay put?”

Thor pushed food around his plate with his fork, avoiding Loki’s gaze.

“Wait… does he think he can _control_ me? Is that it?”

The blonde winced. He rose from the table, shuffling to the bed and climbing under the furs. “Douse the light when you come to bed.”

Loki glanced around Thor’s ascetic quarters, realizing that the bed was literally the only suitable place to sleep. What little other furniture present was not upholstered.

Dramatically sighing, he sat on the edge of Thor’s bed and let his feet dangle. It was his way of asking permission. It had been since they were children. Thor turned over to pull back the covers for his brother, watching the outline of his silhouette flicker in the lamplight.

“Loki,” he began. “What I meant, when I came for your help this morning—It isn’t that I haven’t wanted to visit. I just couldn’t stand to see you rotting away in that cell and be unable to change it. What I meant was, _I_ need you.”

“I know, Thor,” the trickster whispered, and his shoulders heaved a silent sigh as nostalgia swept him away, breaking pieces from an already fragile mind, having been shattered and glued haphazardly back together night after night in the endless dark.

The thunderer pulled himself up and scooted behind Loki, strong arms wrapping around his naked torso. His head lay against the back of Loki’s shoulder, blonde strands cascading down pale chest and arm.

Loki turned, tear-stained cheeks shining in orange glow.

“Do you still want this?” he cried, disbelief plain upon his face as Thor nodded wordlessly. “How can you? I will only try to break you again and again. There is nothing here for you, save pain and self-doubt.”

“Because,” the low rumble reverberated his shoulder-blade, “I can fix it.”

“Liar.”

Thor frowned, “Besides, how can I not want what always invites me back so willingly?” Lips brushed Loki’s skin as calloused fingers dried his cheeks.

The younger man twisted, pulling one leg up against Thor’s thigh. He searched those electric orbs, but found only sincerity. Thor was incapable of anything else.

The blonde leaned in, his forehead resting against Loki’s, one thumb still caressing the side of his cheekbone. He sighed, closed his eyes, and his mouth grazed Loki’s thin lips. When he pulled back, Loki still searched his face in confusion. Immediately, Thor’s eyes went wide and he froze.

“O, Norns, I…”

“Why did you do that?” Loki murmured.

“I thought you wanted it! You’ve been all but throwing yourself at me since we returned to Asgard, and…”

Loki pushed him, forcibly laying him on the furs before straddling his brother, his half-erect cock dribbling onto Thor’s pants. He squirmed until he fitted the outline of Thor’s erection against his ass and leaned down to shove his tongue into Thor’s mouth, boorishly probing with hands planted to either side of that beautiful blonde head. Thrill filled him as he reached down to stroke both shafts together.

“You are not so daft as you seem, brother,” Loki cooed. “I have wanted it, and for far longer than I let on. I simply lacked the opportunity to show you.”

Pulling at Thor’s pants, the trickster threw them on the bed as his brother leaned up, landing kisses on each inch of Loki’s skin within reach. Thor flipped them, one hand spread across Loki’s lower back as he bent to pull at Loki’s lip with teeth bared.

Loki ran spindly fingers down the thunderer’s sides, pressing into his waist and pushing him until Thor relented. Guiding Thor’s hips toward his chest, Loki locked their gaze, a sad smirk gracing his features.

“Do you know what they call me when they think I can’t hear?”

Thor shook his head.

“Thor’s bitch.”

A furrowed eyebrow graced the golden face.

“How will you ‘fix’ that, brother?”

Thor blinked slowly, uttering, “I shall punish the transgressors tomorrow. And tonight,” he gasped as Loki sucked his head past sly lips, “if it makes up for it, I shall be your bitch.”

Hips reeling forward, Thor braced against the headboard as Loki’s tongue rolled over his knob, caressing the edges and lapping up pre-come.

“Thor,” Loki purred, licking a long line up his shaft, “I feel neglected.”

Immediately turning and settling his knees by Loki’s shoulders, Thor angled down and grabbed the trickster’s swollen cock, his lips wrapping around and pulling it in. Loki gasped and arched beneath him, his pale torso conforming to Thor’s bronzed body.

A slender hand reached up, nails etching possession down Thor’s back as Loki bobbed along his girth. The hand flowed across Thor’s ass, kneading taut muscle before recoiling to slide under the thunderer’s thigh. Fingers grazed the back of Thor’s leg, reaching up to fondle his sack and rub against his guiche.

A shiver emanated from Loki’s touch to wind along the blonde’s spine. Coating his fingers with a spell, the trickster pressed and teased around Thor’s hole, relishing the confused jerks and grunts his handling elicited. Thor’s whole body had tightened even as he ground himself against Loki’s touch.

Pulling his mouth from Thor’s cock, he reassured, “Just relax. You want this, don’t you?”

Thor groaned his affirmation for the delicious burn melting him into a puddle of bliss as he was breached. Loki asked no further clarification, vibrations along his girth telling him all he needed to know as his head shot back with a gasp.

The trickster explored each inch of Thor’s nethers that he could reach, gently biting his shaft, sucking on each of his balls, licking the oily trail oozing along the backs of his thighs and following it to the puckered hole his fingers worked with delicate vigor. He pushed against the thunderer’s tightness until he was certain Thor could take three fingers, then he jammed them in to rub against his prostate.

It was all Thor could do to hold himself above his brother, drooling all over the alabaster cock while moans fluttered from his throat. Suddenly, he was spurting hot fluid across Loki’s chest and neck as the trickster bit down hard on his cheek, digits still buried deep inside him, working him through his orgasm.

Loki rolled the collapsed blonde onto the furs, wiped off his chest with Thor’s pants, then got to his knees and turned Thor back onto his belly. His fingers pulled out slowly and he guided his girth into the hammer-hurler’s distended orifice as Thor shook and spasmed. He sighed, sliding in until he was fully sheathed within the god’s constricted crevice.

Laying along Thor’s back, Loki nipped a series of circles into his neck and shoulder, increasingly more vicious as the lie-smith reveled in convulsions around his cock. Thor cried out; Loki finally threw his head back and pressed his palms to the bed as he plunged in and out of his not-brother. The burning stretch long gone, Thor raised his chest as the thrusts became more ragged, Loki’s gasps and groans reverberating in his ears.

“Thor,” he rasped between thrusts, “say it.”

“Say what, brother?”

The thrusting stopped and Loki folded a hand around Thor’s chin, forcing his head back. “You cannot possibly be so dense,” he growled. “Do not play coy with me, thunderer. Say it.”

A devious smile passed fleeting over Thor’s lips, and he whispered, “Tulipan.”

The force in Loki’s brain awoke, stretched, then fell back in upon itself as it fed from the pulsing adrenaline, pushing tendrils near to madness through the trickster’s body. He pounded the other man relentlessly, unheeding the cries echoing from both of their throats. Every nerve on edge, every muscle tensed to strike, he floated just out of reach of his own body, watching, intrigued as euphoria overtook him.

Loki gushed into Thor, moans strangled in his throat as his body went rigid, then drooped down onto Thor’s shoulder blades. He panted, motionless, until the blonde rolled him onto the bed and curled behind him, fitting the trickster against his broad chest and draping an arm over his too-thin waist.

“Krysantemum,” was the last thing Loki heard, muttered against his scalp as he drifted off to sleep.

~*~

Thor wore his hair down the next day, bruises ill-concealed by the blonde locks, but no one dared ask about the strangely human-shaped bites on his neck or push his hair back to see them more clearly. The guards at his door were the same solemn, loyal men who had kept watch over him since boyhood, and held no interest in furthering gossip about the prince.

All the same, gossip strode before Loki in the halls, and he was forced to concoct a marking spell. He used the spell to paint the faces of the blabbermouths a sickly shade of green. Thor confronted him over lunch.

“Loki, I said I would take care of it.”

“I know, brother, I am merely helping you. This way it is apparent who you need to reprimand.”

Thor raised his eyebrows, nodding as he smiled, “You have a point.”

~*~

The attacks of the elves became increasingly more frequent and calculated. They grew bold, vicious, but no one had seen the compelling power that caused this change. Their leader remained behind the scenes.

Thor argued often with Odin about the dormant force within Loki, the Allfather’s stance being that it was for the good of all. The idea that the spell was meant to protect his brother was preposterous.

Loki usually stayed far from the battlefield. It was not his nature to get his hands dirty when so many others were more than willing. He was a tactician and advisor, and it was rare that Thor had need to use the trigger. Besides, most of Loki’s skills with seidr could be easily utilized at a distance.

Once, the brothers were ambushed by a band of Svartalfar as they strolled the lawns outside Asgard’s gate. The elves rose up from the ground as if rising above the foaming waves, dirt crumbling from their shoulders and weapons. Thor and Loki crouched back to back, Mjolnir at the ready as the trickster snarled obscenities at the increasing numbers of their enemies. Loki reached for his throwing knives, pausing to nudge the thunderer.

“Now is a good time, Thor.”

“Nonsense, Loki, we can handle this pitiful lot—“

“We can argue after, just say it!”

A pause, then, softly, “Tulipan,” and Thor moved into the fray.

The word came as Loki flung his hand to release the knives, one flying clear while the other two embedded in the chest and skull of the nearest foe. Unsheathing his sword, he wove his way around the elves as nimbly as they had done against the einherjar. His grace and fluid movements belied the strength of a frost giant beneath them, and each thrust dealt another elf a mortal blow.

It was as he parted the head from one elf’s neck that he saw another creeping up behind his brother. He had time to scream Thor’s name before searing pain radiated from above his hip. In shock, he glanced down to see the tip of an elven blade retreating through his gut. He barely felt the hammer whistle past his shoulder as he fell, though the unearthly scream from behind him rang through his head.

Eyes wide and panting heavily, Loki’s clouded gaze turned upwards once more. He glimpsed a figure at the edge of the wood, the face disfigured and darkened. He gritted his teeth, pushing to his feet amid the sprawled bodies of the Svartalfar, and lurched toward the forest. Thor turned to see his halting march and called his name; Loki glanced back briefly, and in that moment, the figure disappeared. He redoubled his efforts, staggering until Thor’s hand upon his shoulder and the suppression word in his ears found him slumping against his brother’s chest.

~*~

Light crept into his eyes, the warmth of the sun through the glass wall breathing life back into a body stilled by sleep. He pushed the furs down to his waist, wincing at the ache in his side, and turned his bare back to the glow. A weight shifted the bed behind him, a shadow cast over his pallid form, and a hand rested upon his arm.

“Loki?”

A grunt, fingers rubbing lazily at his eyes, and he half turned to see Thor’s blazing smile. The blonde leaned in for a hug, then stopped, propping himself in a hover over Loki’s figure.

“Gna did her best, but the wound was very deep and you worsened it when you tried to go into the forest.”

Loki nodded, his voice gravelly. “How long have I been asleep?”

“Since only yesterday.”

The trickster slowly pulled himself up to lean against the headboard, one hand pressing to the wound.

“What were you going into the forest for?”

“There was another elf—his face was scarred, as if he had been burned and the charred flesh never sloughed away. His eye caught mine, and I heard a name. Malekith. I believe he is the one pulling their strings.”

Thor nodded, only half-hearing, captivated as he was by the scar tissue criss-crossing his brother’s body. The newest scars were still pink and raised, while the older ones had partially faded back into Loki’s alabaster flesh. The hammer-hurler leaned forward to inspect the twin wounds at his brother’s side and beside his navel. His fingers traced lightly over the gnarled skin.

Whispering, he gazed up at Loki. “Does it still hurt?”

A sigh, simultaneously contemptuous and content. “Yes.”

Thor’s head bowed, muggy breath upon Loki’s skin before rough lips grazed the point of entry, covering every bump and nodule of scar tissue before moving to the exit wound. He kissed along the periphery slowly, each movement like a small prayer. His hands moved along Loki’s thigh, found the imprint of the frost beast’s claw.

The thunderer’s tongue traced along the top edge of the scar, moving lower and following the mark to the inside. He sucked gently, Loki’s fingers combing through his hair. When he reached the knee, he realized it was the same knee he had shattered months ago. His fingers palpated through the scarred flesh, and he kissed all around its marred topography.

Sitting back, he ogled the trickster. Loki lay in a daze, shoulders against the wooden bed and one knee bent to meet his arm, myriad scars from his invasion of Midgard weaving a perverse saga across his marble skin, leaking cock half-stiff from Thor’s ministrations. Thor’s hand glided across Loki’s ribs, feeling for the one he had cracked during their skirmish. He bent, his head brushing against the top of Loki’s thigh as he licked and sucked the thick tissue over the bone.

Loki caught a fistful of blonde hair, pulling back gently to survey Thor’s sparking blue eyes. Tears threatened to wet the cheeks of the thunderer, but he smiled despite them. He leaned forward once more to inspect the fading scars from Banner, kissing Loki’s forehead, his eyebrow, the bridge of his nose, his cheek, his jaw, and finally licking the long scar that split his lower lip until his tongue slipped into Loki’s mouth.

Loud raps in succession shook the door, interrupting their kiss even as Loki bit down on Thor’s tongue. The thunderer rose from the bed, holding out one finger in a plea for time as he shuffled to the door. He cracked it open, nodding after a moment of hushed counsel and then pressing it closed with a sigh.

Thor slid back onto the bed, carefully conforming his body around his brother and kissing his cheek. “Odin wishes to speak with me. I won’t be long. You should go down to the scullery and find some breakfast. I shall meet you there.”

The glare Loki replied with spoke plainly of his annoyance, but he moved to stand with, “As you wish, brother.”

A helpless half-smile and Thor disappeared through the heavy chamber door. Footsteps receded down the cavernous halls, until finally Loki could not even hear them in his imagination. He dressed in as little as was necessary to escape notice, and ran his fingers through his hair, the inky black bleeding away into dark auburn curls. He pressed his palms to his face, darkening his complexion while freckles bloomed across his cheeks. His nose became wider and more bulbous, and his jaw took on a much more square shape. Only his viridian eyes remained constant.

In the washroom, a few loose stones concealed a little-used corridor that Loki had first discovered as a boy. He and Thor would sneak between each others’ rooms long after Frigga had put them to bed, then forget to separate before morning, and their mother would find them passed out on the same mattress. There was a turn in the corridor connecting it to other hidden passageways that ran throughout the castle, and as Loki grew older, he began exploring the maze of secreted adventures.

One of these passages led straight to the throne room, and opened behind a great column so that a person could utilize it without being seen. It was this path Loki took, lighting his way with a dim glow on his fingertips. He slid the stones away from the throne room wall in the midst of a heated argument between Thor and Odin.

“—not have to use such a thing for him to help me. He is still my brother!”

“You may wish him to be your brother all you want, but though we raised you together, he is not. He knows that now, and he rejects his relationship to us. It is for the good of all Asgard that the spell remains in place, and you would be a fool not to use it when appropriate.”

“For the good of Asgard, but not for the good of Loki.”

“It protects him, too. It—“

“It makes him reckless, is what it does. I’ll not see him dead for the good of all Asgard or any other realm for that matter. It focuses his energies and attention, but for what? What good is an unbalanced blade, a cracked bow, or a wobbly mace? Without the spell, his accuracy is unparalleled, and—“

“And he is still unbalanced. He would turn on you as easily as he would our enemies.”

“I cannot believe that.”

“Believe it, boy. Heimdall informed me of the events on Midgard, both during your banishment and this more recent invasion with the Chitauri. He cannot be trusted.”

“He has changed.”

“You strive to resurrect the boy you grew up with, but that is a hopeless dream. That boy is dead. Open your eyes, lest you doom Asgard and the rest of the realms for want of something that will never return.”

“You don’t understand, Father. He is different now.”

“No, Thor. It is you who fails to understand. Loki is who he is, and no amount of wishing will change that. I trust you to do the right thing when Malekith comes knocking on our front door. Use the weapon I have created for you. It is yours alone.”

Loki peeked around the column to see Odin turning back to his throne, effectively ending the conversation. Thor saluted the Allfather with a fist over his chest, then strode briskly from the room. The trickster scrambled back into the passage, hurrying through until he came to the kitchen. He passed his hands over his face as he ran, reforming the familiar visage.

Thor burst into the scullery to see Loki sitting at a rough wooden table eating fruit. He stole up the slighter man and wrapped his arms around him, tears on his cheeks echoing the squall outside.

“Thor,” Loki choked, “can’t… breathe…”

Released just a fraction, Loki gulped air and patted Thor’s back.

“I take it the talk with Odin did not go well?”

Wrath visibly shook Thor as he pulled back to stare at his brother. “I can’t lose you, not again.”

Loki feigned surprise, pressing a hand to his most recent scar. “I know I was out for a day, but surely you could not think this scratch would do me in.”

The thunderer only pulled him close again, sniffling into his black tresses like a spurned maiden. The storm raged, rumbling the palace as Thor’s pent-up emotions bled all over Loki’s shirt.

Loki rubbed his back, breakfast all but forgotten, until Thor quieted. Gently, the trickster guided him onto the stool next to him, thumbs rubbing over the tendons in the blonde’s forearms as Loki gazed up with the same beseeching look he had given so long ago, before their ill-fated journey into Jotunheim.

“Tell me what happened.”

“He wants me to use the spell to defeat Asgard’s enemies.”

“I don’t see the problem, Thor.”

“It will kill you! You don’t see the problem in that?” Thor gaped, groping for words. “It is meant to sacrifice you to save the rest of us.”

“Surely, it can’t do all that. It only enhances my skills.”

“Odin has given you up for lost, and intends to use you as a weapon.”

Loki stared at his hands, twisting the hem of his shirt between deft fingers. “Then he… means to destroy us.”

Thor’s fingers reached out, interlacing with his brother’s. “He can’t! Not after all I’ve done to get you back. Not after all the gains you’ve made. Go talk to him, he has to see that you’ve changed.”

Squeezing Thor’s hands, Loki sighed, “Shhh. It doesn’t matter, now. You know he won’t be swayed, especially when it comes to me. I must play my part, and you must play yours. The Norns will decide the outcome.”

Leaning in, Loki pulled Thor toward him, their lips meeting in the inpalpable anguish between them. When they parted, Thor pressed his forehead to his brother’s.

Misery laced his whispers. “I cannot lose you again. I love you.”

Loki stopped breathing a moment, his heart beating double as he muttered, “I know.”

~*~

 _I love you._ Three simple words that held so much weight he could not bear to say them for fear of suffocation. An hour had passed, and Thor was enveloped in slumber, the thick musk of earlier desperate fornication hanging like smog in his chambers.

Loki hovered over the immense figure sprawled across the bed like a starfish searching for food. His hand curled about a massive, gnarled thorn, one finger teasing the sharp point in a final bid for redemption. He had rummaged through the chest for his armors and donned them with a slow sensuality usually reserved for his lovers, long fingers stroking deftly over each fold and hem, each buckle and button done up with delicate grace. He but lacked the beautiful, curving helmet and billowing green cape; such things were made for showmanship and would only slow him down.

He bent, one knee upon the mattress as he rolled Thor onto his back. The thunderer murmured unintelligibly in his sleep, and Loki kissed him, chaste and lingering, the thorn floating just above his beating heart. He pulled back to plunge it in, forced himself to see how he shattered their love, how he drove it through with wickedness so thick and viscous it could never fully be removed.

Thor’s eyes flew open and he gasped, choking disbelief smothering him in greasy fingers. He reached out, but Loki had already stood straight again, looking down his nose as his brother flailed helpless and wordless on the bed. He bled surprisingly little, the spell taking quick effect; Loki pulled the furs up to keep his body warm before stealing out through the wall in the washroom.

~*~

The horse blew flecks of foam back toward her frenzied rider, but still he urged her on. Each stride fed into her nervous nature, the sting of the crop on her flank nearly sending her into a panic as the galloping staccato echoed from the cliffs. They fed upon each other’s worry, only the substantial resolve of a scheme put into action propelling them yet along the rocks instead of over their side.

Loki crouched low on the chestnut’s back, whispering reassurances in which he held no belief. He gave her free reign, relying on leg pressure to guide their haphazard flight. Every time he glanced over his shoulder, apparitions leapt effortlessly among the boulders and gained even though his horse gave her all. They would flicker and disappear with a blink, but that they existed at all gave him reason to be unsettled.

The pair descended hastily on the other side of the cliff, both almost falling headlong at the breakneck speed, until they reached the shores of a serene lake, silver water lapping lazily at smoothed pebbles by the ghostly light of Asgard’s twin moons. He pulled her up, sliding off into the shallows as she fought the bit, and crouched down to fill his hands with the clear water.

Agitation still gripped the mare while he murmured encouragement and brought cupped hands to her mouth. Slowly, she calmed enough to suck refreshment from his palms, and he guided her bridle to her feet that she might drink her fill.

Both feeling slightly refreshed, Loki reached his foot into the stirrup and swung his leg over, settling uncomfortably into the cracked leather saddle. He clucked at his steed, patting her sweat-soaked neck and winding the coarse hair of her mane through his fingers. Wearily, she eased into a slow canter, and he let her set the pace as they had been sprinting half the night.

The moons lingered low on the horizon behind them, and the sun’s first rays lit the forest before them in muted pinks. They skirted the edge of the lake, picking their way along a path between the shore and the encroaching tree line. Loki still glanced behind them often, but he was able to relax a bit as the specters had subsided. They rounded a corner to face a small party of five einherjar and the Allfather.

 _Damn._ He shortened the reins, pulling sideways in an attempt to escape. From the trees behind them, five more einherjar emerged.

“If you fight, you’ll only make it worse for yourself,” Odin admonished.

Loki sneered, keeping the one-eyed god in his peripheral vision as he backed toward the lake.

“Where is Thor?” he demanded, his horse now splashing in the shallows.

Odin ignored him, signaling all ten guards to advance upon their quarry. He spurred the russet mare, but all the fight had been run out of her in their dash from the palace. Dismounting, he waded backward as water crept up the black leather and green fabric of his armor. The einherjar advanced slowly, their gold-plated boots just reaching the shallows.

He turned, water lapping at his waist, and dove, but the guards were ready with an enormous net woven of shimmering gossamer threads. The throw executed with expertise, they hauled in their catch to find not the black-haired man of the chase, but a splendid, monstrous salmon, hunchbacked and hook-jawed, thrashing wildly as the net sheared clusters of pearlescent scales and wound around his translucent fins. Loki’s armor floated forgotten among the reeds and tumbled gently across the rocky lakebed.

~*~

It was a full day’s ride back to the palace, all of the horses far too winded to maintain the flat gallops of the morning. Only Sleipnir remained perky and fresh as always, while poor Skotta, Loki’s chestnut mare, dragged her hooves at the rear, led by an einherji while her master flopped and strained on her back, first as a fish and later a man, nude and shivering, bound and tangled, tied in multiple places across her saddle.

Arrival at the palace meant only one thing for Loki. Odin hauled him down to the crystal prison himself, throwing him in with net still entwining and leaving wordlessly. Hours passed, and the shapeshifter managed to pick his way out of the throttling ropes. He bathed in cold water, washing away the smell of horse and lake and fish, but had been afforded no luxuries such as garments.

Frigga found him fetally curled on a bare mattress, face to the wall, trembling in fitful sleep. She set his meager dinner on the lone table and approached him, shaking out a thick blanket and pulling it around his body. She stroked him until his breathing evened, delicate fingers combing through still-wet hair and down his sides and back.

Quite sure that he would not awaken, she lay down behind him, curling her small frame around his larger, lankier form. Her fingers caressed his cheeks and she whispered and cooed against his shoulders as she had not had opportunity to do in a thousand years. He dreamed that night, more vividly and surreally than he had in centuries.

_Loki was bound in a cavern, much as he was foretold to be at Ragnarok. His head wrenched back at an unnatural angle, and blurry visions played out on the stalactiform ceiling. The colors were dull, but he could make out what appeared to be himself and his brother battling on the intact Bifrost from an observer’s perspective. He watched himself fall, not from being pushed, but from letting go of Gungnir. The shadows behind him shifted and searing pain blacked out his sight as he howled and writhed against the rotting shackles._

_Gradually, the pain subsided and he opened his eyes again to behold his own crazed figure in combat against the flame-scarred elf. As cunning and surefooted as Loki, Malekith matched him blow for blow. Loki yelled for Thor to say the trigger, but Thor refused again and again. The scene faded out and he fell through the fetters and the water-smoothed floor of the cave, through the core of Asgard and out the other side, then into the abyss again, swallowing him like the proverbial whale for his misdeeds._

His own shrill scream brought him from restless slumber, ripping him through the stages of sleep like some benthic monster forced to the surface by an overzealous angler’s hook. He bolted up, shaking and sweating ice and squinting around his sterile chambers as if he didn’t know each divot and scrape by heart. His mother’s blanket about his shoulders, he padded to the table where Frigga had left a simple shirt and pants, as well as his long-cold dinner. He dressed and ate quickly, then took to remapping the contents and construction of his cell, his fingers exploring every inch of floor, walls, and furniture.

There had to be a way out. There was always a way out for Loki.

~*~

It was months later that Thor found him scouring the tiles for a chip or hole that led to a secret passage. White walls were now smeared with dried and fresh blood, fingerprints in red on the tabletop, and Loki ignored him completely.

The thunderer watched, breathless, for minutes until, bested by grief, his voice cracked around the single word, “Brother.”

Loki stiffened, wild eyes searching the floor as if they held the answer to the phantom voice until he spoke again.

“Loki, look at me.”

He glanced up, black waves falling disheveled over his face in a veil against the outside world, pupils dilated from the corners of his eyes. He rose, slowly, as if Thor were a feral animal and swift movement or harsh noise would scare him away. Sidestepping to the glass door, he leaned in close as if to share a secret, his cheek against the pane.

“After… after all this time… you come before me, brother? W-Why? To mock?”

The pained expression Thor had become so fond of captured his face as he watched his beloved sibling skittering around the room and barely aware of his own surroundings. Loki’s eyes and mouth all formed the comically round shapes of a sheet ghost and he stepped back, knees buckling as they hit the edge of the bed. His head knocked to the wall without eliciting so much as a wince, and he slouched against the tarnished stone.

“Are you real, then? Every other time you have disappeared, but now you stay? Is this some new level of madness? Are you real? What have they done to you?” he gibbered, barely intelligible and mostly to himself though his eyes never left Thor.

Dismissing the guards, Thor opened the door to the cell and knelt before Loki, covering the pale hands with his own. He stared at the contrast of eggshell white and glowing tan, restless fingers twitching and scratching within his palms. Loki’s half-smile held no mischief now, only nervous uncertainty as unfocusing eyes stared right through his blonde head.

Squeezing his fingers, Thor whispered, “Loki? I’m here, Loki.”

He leaned in, wrapping his great arms around his brother and holding him as Loki hummed a melancholy tune from their childhood and swayed back and forth, a toddler on an invisible swing in the path of an imaginary breeze. Thor’s hands petted the soft waves and pallid cheeks and his lips alit on Loki’s blood-encrusted mouth.

When he pulled back, brushing a tear away with the heel of his hand, Loki stared at him, as lucid and attentive as a hunting falcon. The trickster’s body was tense and still. A terrible hatred radiated from his eyes and voice.

“You let me fall again.”

A violent shove and Thor flailed on his back, mouth agape while his eyebrows strove desperately to unite. He pushed to his feet, blocking the door bodily while Loki lounged on the mattress, spindly fingers reaching up to fondle his stiffening package. Mischief incarnate possessed his lopsided grin as Thor shifted and glanced away.

Voice barely a growl, he breathed, “What did you come here for, dear brother?”

Thor concentrated on the stones just to the left of Loki’s head as his report echoed in the dungeon.

“Malekith has brought the war to us. Asgard needs you, Loki.”

“And what will Asgard give its bastard son in return?” he sighed, hands now full of throbbing cock barely concealed beneath forest green dress.

“Freedom. Pardon for all your crimes. The chance to start anew. But, Loki, you should know that when you betray me, I will kill you.” Thor’s gaze returned to his brother’s face, an image of paradox perfection undaunted by the thunderer’s idle threats and resolute visage.

Loki’s back arched away from the wall, teeth biting down on ulcerated lips as he stroked himself to completion, fucking into his own hand as he once thrust into Thor’s stretched depths. He slumped casually back, reveling in the arousal evident on Thor’s cheeks.

Voice drunk and low, he murmured, “When do we start?”

~*~

Shrilling battle cries pierced the air, the brothers crouched back to back amid the ringing clash of metal and grunts of the fallen. Each knife thrown found its mark, each swing of the hammer brought down another foe, and the lust of battle lent a mad glint to eyes green and blue.

They moved as one, a four-legged sentient beast with deadly intent, as they waded deeper, picking over bodies of ally and enemy. Always close by, Sif and the Warriors Three found their own glory, a path of elven corpses their breadcrumbs back to the gates. The six of them traversed towards Malekith’s silhouette upon the knoll, each glimpse afforded them quickly banished by flashing blade or whistling mace.

It was Sif who felt first the gathering of power foreign to Asgard. The edges of a coruscating vortex transparent before Malekith, she followed the beam as it swept the battlefield, a searchlight for victims of the elf’s master plan. Paralysis settled upon her like a blanket soaked in melting ice while her comrades encircled her protectively against the Svartalfar. She could just move her eyes enough to notice Thor and Loki equally enthralled, and equally surrounded by einherjar.

“Loooookiiiiiiiii,” the Voice rumbled, emanating from all around and within them, yet captivating only the two princes and warrior maiden.

She felt, more than heard, Loki’s silken reply reverberate along the fraying edges of her mind. _Malekith_

“Leave your brother and come to me. Together we will have our vengeance upon these parasitic Asgardians who would crush the spirits of our people.”

 _Our people?_ His face was numb, but a smirk shone through in his tone. _I have no people, elf. Do not think me a mewling babe too naïve to see through your honeyed lies. You forget to whom you speak._

“I know exactly to whom I speak! Loki, lie-smith. Loki, silvertongue. Loki, the trickster. Loki, the only one whose presence or absence deals the fatal blow to the almighty Thor!” Malekith mocked.

Shimmering dread overtook Loki and lifted him, limp and unresisting, through the air. As the vortex receded, Sif and Thor fell to their knees heaving. Two words echoed in the thunderer’s head, over and over in a frantic, commanding chant: _Say it._

The blood of his enemies plastered his face in macabre abstract art. He hefted to his feet, turning full-face to the elven leader and his brother’s ragdoll form helplessly floating above the din. His hands lifted to funnel around his mouth, though he knew it was unneeded.

“Tulipan!” he shouted, and the slumbering enchantment roared to life within Loki.

The trickster disappeared amid a red glow so intense it eclipsed even Asgard’s blazing sun. He shot like a comet through fast-forming cloud cover, the tail made not of ice and dust but pure magic, refracting amid the downpour. Malekith sidestepped a second before the living ball of energy would have punched a hole right through his stomach, and Loki dug his heels in for purchase, the rocky ground buckling and protesting with dust and gravel.

He advanced upon the elf, two spells hurled as harbingers for each step taken. Malekith dodged and reflected each assault. At last, they stood sword’s length from each other, Malekith unsheathing his blade as a massive icicle augmented Loki’s arm. They danced as unwilling partners burdened with cumbersome props, twisting and thrusting in turn as the scene below melted away.

Each chip on the frozen saber filled instantly, threatening fog pulsing from it in waves. Where it connected with Malekith’s skin, fresh burns opened and smoked uncauterized. Wounds inflicted upon the repurposed frost giant bled unheeded as he backed the elf upon the precipice. Eyes wild, Malekith threw his sword away and dropped to his knees, hands raised. Loki’s ice-blade hovered above the elf’s shoulder, and then he was airborne, jagged rocks tearing at his back as he gasped for air.

Malekith above him with dagger raised, Loki heard the suppression word in a desperate plea whispered amid the crackling ozone, but it was too late, there was no way out, and then he was falling, the void so maddening and enticing below him. Thor’s hand around his wrist, dragging him up as Malekith’s screams drowned in the expanse below him, and finally, finally Thor’s arms wrapped around him, cradled him against the smell of death but it was too cold, his chest hurt, and it was all wrong.

Thor held the body until the blood washed away to mix with the mud, the elves retreating in fear below him and his friends lingering in a protective watch yards away. He pulled the elven dagger from his brother’s heart, holding it with two fingers as if it were a foreign, feared thing, and tossed it upon the rocks.

~*~

It happened so quickly. There just wasn’t enough time to react.

That’s what everyone told him, though he blamed his father for the spell and himself for using it, unable to even look at the king for fear of contempt betraying him.

It was months before he could bring himself to open Loki’s door, creaking wood protesting after sitting idle for years. He threw himself on the mattress, leaving wrinkles in the pristine sheets and blankets and furs, and pored over books that held no solace, leaving them lying around in a disarray that would have sent his brother into a frustrated tirade. Their secrets remained hidden to Thor.

Once, when winter had passed and Freya was again busily igniting the world in pastel buds and intoxicating fragrance, he opened the balcony doors to cleanse the musty odor from the room. Next to the railing, partially hidden by the intricate stonework frame lay a few falcon feathers, each barb knitted impeccably with its neighbor. Falcons had not graced the palace grounds for more than two years.

As Thor turned back to the dark embrace of Loki’s room, his own name whispered past his ear. It was then he noticed an empty hook where Loki had kept his falcon feather cloak.


End file.
